Expecto … pizza? That’s the magic spell that bonded Sandra Bullock’s kids, Louis and Laila, and Harry Potter himself, Daniel Radcliffe, on the set of their new action-packed romantic comedy, The Lost City. “They asked me for pizza,” the British actor tells Yahoo Entertainment about how that first meeting went down in the Dominican Republic, where the film was shot. (Watch our interview above.)
“We had ordered pizza from a restaurant and had it delivered,” Radcliffe explains. “Then we became aware that there were kids at the next table who did not have pizza, and we felt bad about the fact that we were just shoveling pizza in our faces in front of a bunch of kids who didn’t have any. So we were like, ‘Hey, come have some!'”
Radcliffe adds that Louis and Laila “played it very cool” at that impromptu pizza summit, and only later learned that they were “hyped” to be in the presence of the Wizarding World’s most famous citizen. And Bullock confirms that both of her kids knew exactly who Radcliffe was, even if they didn’t geek out by asking him to name his favorite Bertie Bott’s jelly bean flavor or summon a Patronus on the spot.
“They don’t go fan crazy,” she says of her kids, who later schooled her on their Potter-knowledge. “I came home from work, and they said, ‘Dan gave us some pizza!’ I was like, ‘Who’s Dan?’ Is he an adult? We don’t have a Dan in our movie.’ And they were like, ‘Yes you do! He’s from Harry Potter.’ I said, ‘His name is Daniel,’ but it turns out I was wrong! Daniel likes to go by Dan. I learned this from an 11-year-old!”
To be fair, Radcliffe’s character in The Lost City is very different from the virtuous Harry Potter. If anything, he’s closer to his old Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Severus Snape. The movie’s high-concept premise casts Bullock as romance novelist, Loretta Sage, who is kidnapped by Radcliffe’s cartoonishly villainous treasure hunter, Abigail Fairfax, and forced to help him locate a long-lost tomb. It’s up to Loretta’s hapless cover model, Alan (Channing Tatum), to save her — although she’s generally saving him during the course of their adventure.
While Radcliffe may not seem like the obvious choice to break bad, The Lost City directors Adam and Aaron Nee specifically wrote the role of Fairfax for the 32-year-old actor. “He was the only guy we wanted,” Adam Nee says, adding that they were directly inspired by the actor’s performance as a corpse in the 2016 cult favorite Swiss Army Man. “We were like, ‘This guy can do anything. We’d love to see his take on a villain.’ What he brought to the film was incredible.”
Since wrapping the Harry Potter franchise in 2011, Radcliffe’s name has been brought up in connection with playing various comic book favorites, including Spider-Man and Wolverine, but the actor has repeatedly shot down those rumors. Still, he insists that he hasn’t ruled out playing a supervillain or a superhero — though another heel turn would be a blast after The Lost City. “I’ve been trying to put to bed the Wolverine thing because it’s not based in anything, and just keeps coming up! But anything like that is super. If the script is interesting and cool, then I’m in.”
For the record, Bullock heartily endorses Radcliffe’s turn towards comic book villainy — “You’d be amazing,” she tells him — and would happily take a walk on the dark side herself. “They’re the best,” says the actress, who previously voiced Minions baddie, Scarlet Overkill, in the 2015 animated hit. “It’s hard doing the right thing all the time; it’s more fun to be the hated one!”
Bullock has previously revealed in interviews that there was no love lost between her daughter, Laila, and Tatum’s daughter, Everly, prior to making The Lost City. “They were four and five when [those fights] went down,” she remembers. “They were very strong, A-type bull-headed young women — I don’t know where [Laila] gets that from! — who were trying to take each other down on a daily basis.”
But being on set together for the duration of filming resulted in what Bullock describes as a “major love-fest” between the now-eight-year-olds. “Chan and I decided that we did this film so we could live across from each other and have extended playdate,” she says, laughing. “It was summer love for the two of them! It was pretty amazing — they’re strong women.” Sounds like they’re also natural Gryffindors.
— Video produced by Jen Kucsak and edited by John Santo
The Lost City premieres Mar. 25 in theaters
